Buckling Analysis of Functionally Graded Sandwich Plates under Both Mechanical and Thermal Loads

This paper presents an analytical solution for the thermomechanical buckling of functionally graded material (FGM) sandwich plates. The solution is obtained using a four-variable equivalent-single-layer (ESL) plate theory. Two types of sandwich plates are included: one with FGM facesheets and homogeneous core, and vice versa for the other. The governing equations are derived based on the principle of minimum total potential energy. For simply supported boundary conditions, these equations are solved via the Navier method. The results on critical buckling load and temperature increment of simply supported FGM sandwich plates are compared with the available solutions in the literature. Several results are presented considering various material and geometrical parameters as well as their effect on the thermomechanical buckling response of FGM sandwich plates. The relationship between the mechanical load and the temperature increment for uniform/linear temperature rise of FGM sandwich plates under combined mechanical and thermal loads is studied.